


Your Loss

by Kittie



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Character Death, M/M, Tumblr request
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-30
Updated: 2015-06-30
Packaged: 2018-04-07 00:14:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4242084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kittie/pseuds/Kittie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He doesn’t know until the Inquisitor looks at him with sympathy. He glances around, looking at himself. He is not injured. He is fine sans the taunt feeling in his shoulder where a red templar hit him far harder than he originally thought. Cassandra and Dorian trail behind him. Breath stills in his throat. Balthazar is reaching out, hand placed upon his shoulder.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your Loss

He doesn’t know.

He doesn’t know until the Inquisitor looks at him with sympathy. He glances around, looking at himself. He is not injured. He is fine sans the taunt feeling in his shoulder where a red templar hit him far harder than he originally thought. Cassandra and Dorian trail behind him. Breath stills in his throat. Balthazar is reaching out, hand placed upon his shoulder.

“ I’m sorry for your loss. “

This isn’t loss. This isn’t anything he’d ever felt before. Emotions get thrown under the layers of armor as Cullen bypasses the Inquisitor entirely. He thinks Cassandra reaches after him before thinking better of it. Good. He doesn’t think he can open his mouth enough to speak more than a growl. 

Earth is misplaced, blood coats his armor. The battle had been won but at what cost? Both knew going in there was a chance neither of them would make it ( he doesn’t hear the whispers; he can’t bear to hear them speak to him like he’s some emotionally crippled man ). 

The Iron Bull’s body is just that– a body. It’s something to be burn or– whatever Then Qun does with their dead. Cullen hasn’t the slightest idea. He’ll have to ask Krem. Shit, Krem. He’s so busy with his own grief he doesn’t hear Krem until the man is beside him, hand gripping the armor on his shoulders far tighter than needed.

Amber meets chocolate and Krem’s face blurs. No, not here. Cullen allows the grip, it steadies him as they look at the body of the Qunari mercenary that saved both of them. His life was not thrown away. He would be remembered for serving the Inquisition and giving his life so others may live. Or, at least, go through the motions of living. 

It is only later, after the festivities that he does not attend, does Cullen finally grieve for a partner that no longer breathes the same air as himself. A partner that won’t be there when the nightmares hit. A partner that won’t be able to spar when his irritation hits an all time high and he needs to hit something that’ll hit back and make him earn his exhaustion. 

The Iron Bull is burned, half a dragon’s tooth against his chest as the funeral pyre is lit. His weapon is taken and placed in the Commander’s Office. No one asks. No one dares broach the subject with the man that buries himself far deeper into his work than he ever did previously. 

No one notices the matching half of bone tucked under the plate of his armor day in and day out; even years later.


End file.
